What Scripture says
Scripture says God is the source of life:
- God made living things “according to their kinds” (Genesis 1:24, ESV).
- “The LORD God formed the man of dust from the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life” (Genesis 2:7).
- “With you is the fountain of life” (Psalm 36:9).
- God “gives to all mankind life and breath and everything” (Acts 17:25).
- “In him was life, and the life was the light of men” (John 1:4).
Interestingly, Genesis has God command the earth and waters to produce life: “Let the earth sprout vegetation” (Genesis 1:11), “Let the waters swarm” (Genesis 1:20), “Let the earth bring forth living creatures” (Genesis 1:24). Some interpreters see room here for God working through natural processes; others read these as direct creative acts. Either way, God is the one commanding.
What the evidence says
Science
Science has not explained how life first began. This isn’t a creationist talking point; leading origin-of-life researchers say it openly. The field is active and full of competing ideas.
A short history
- Spontaneous generation disproved. For centuries people thought life arose regularly from non-living matter (maggots from meat, for example). Louis Pasteur’s experiments around 1860 showed that life comes only from life, under normal conditions.
- The “primordial soup” (1920s). Alexander Oparin and J. B. S. Haldane proposed that life began in an early ocean rich in simple chemicals.
- Miller–Urey (1953). Stanley Miller passed electric sparks through a mixture of gases and produced amino acids, building blocks of proteins. It was a landmark, though scientists now think the early atmosphere was different from the one he used.
- Space. Amino acids have been found in meteorites, such as the Murchison meteorite that fell in Australia in 1969.
- The RNA world (1980s). The discovery that RNA can both store information and speed up chemical reactions (Nobel Prize, 1989) led to the idea that life began with self-copying RNA, before DNA and proteins.
- Newer ideas include life beginning at deep-sea hydrothermal vents, in warm ponds that repeatedly dry and refill, or on mineral surfaces.
What remains unsolved
| Stage | What’s been shown | What’s still unsolved |
|---|---|---|
| Building blocks | Some amino acids and nucleotides can form naturally | Producing them together, in the right amounts, under realistic conditions |
| Handedness | Life uses only “left-handed” amino acids and “right-handed” sugars | How this single-handedness arose |
| Self-copying molecules | Short RNA strands can be made in labs; some RNA can copy short pieces | A self-copying RNA system arising on its own |
| The first cell | Fatty molecules can form bubble-like membranes | Combining genes, metabolism and membrane into a living cell |
The simplest living cells are remarkably complex. In 2016, scientists built a synthetic bacterium with a genome stripped down to 473 genes, and still didn’t know what about a third of them did.
The debate
Researchers like chemist Lee Cronin are optimistic that the problem will eventually be solved. Others, like synthetic chemist James Tour, a Christian, argue that the field’s progress is far smaller than headlines suggest, and that the chemistry involved is much harder than generally admitted. Their public debate (linked below) gives a good sense of both sides.
Some Christian thinkers, such as Stephen Meyer, go further and argue that the information stored in DNA is best explained by an intelligent cause, since in our experience functional information comes from minds (see 2.13).
Where they meet
The gap between chemistry and the simplest cell is real, and it fits the biblical claim that life comes from God.
But caution is needed. A “God of the gaps” argument says, “Science can’t explain this, so God did it.” If science later fills the gap, the argument collapses, and faith looks foolish. The phrase was popularized by the Christian physicist Charles Coulson in the 1950s, as a warning to fellow believers. A better argument doesn’t rest on what we don’t know, but on what we do: that information-rich systems, in our experience, come from minds. And the Christian claim is that God is behind life however it began, not only in the parts science can’t yet explain. If a natural pathway were found, it would show how God worked, not that he didn’t.
What’s still open
Almost everything about life’s origin. Future research may find a natural pathway, or may find the problem harder than expected.
Bottom line
Not yet. No accepted natural pathway from chemicals to the first cell exists; it is an open research field. Christians should be careful not to make a “God of the gaps” argument. This is rated Debated.